• Toxicological Research
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.65-72
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• 2007

This study was conducted to obtain information of the oral dose acute toxicity of PGB-2, a novel polyglucosamine polymer produced from Citrobacter sp. BL-4 (a new strain) in male and female mice. Mortality, body weight changes, clinical signs were monitored during 14 days after single oral dose of test article at dose levels of 2000, 1000, 500, 250 and 125 ml/kg. Gross lesions, organ weight and histopathology of principal organs were examined after necropsy. As the results, we could not find any mortalities, clinical signs, changes in the body weight and gross findings except for white foci in the liver. In addition, no PGB-2-treatment related abnormal changes on the organ weight and histopathology of principle organs were detected except for atypical signs of liver. White liver foci were confirmed as focal infiltration of inflammatory cells. The results suggest that the PGB-2 is relatively safe in mice but the possibility of hepatotoxicity could not be excluded. The $LD_{50}$ and approximate LD in mice after single oral dose of PGB-2 were considered over 2000 mg/kg, respectively. In future, the potential hepatotoxicity of PGB-2 should be evaluated through the repeat dose toxicity test prior to develop as a new agent.

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.491-502
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• 2020

Sex/gender disparity has been shown in the incidence and prognosis of many types of diseases, probably due to differences in genes, physiological conditions such as hormones, and lifestyle between the sexes. The mortality and survival rates of many cancers, especially liver cancer, differ between men and women. Due to the pronounced sex/gender disparity, considering sex/gender may be necessary for the diagnosis and treatment of liver cancer. By analyzing research articles through a PubMed literature search, the present review identified 12 genes which showed practical relevance to cancer and sex disparities. Among the 12 sex-specific genes, 7 genes (BAP1, CTNNB1, FOXA1, GSTO1, GSTP1, IL6, and SRPK1) showed sex-biased function in liver cancer. Here we summarized previous findings of cancer molecular signature including our own analysis, and showed that sex-biased molecular signature CTNNB1^High, IL6^High, RHOA^High and GLIPR1^Low may serve as a female-specific index for prediction and evaluation of OS in liver cancer patients. This review suggests a potential implication of sex-biased molecular signature in liver cancer, providing a useful information on diagnosis and prediction of disease progression based on gender.

• Preventive Nutrition and Food Science
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• v.7 no.4
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• pp.454-460
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• 2002

While atherosclerosis is a major killer, there is now concern that mortality from the disease will increase due to the rising incidence of type II diabetes. Because diet can potentially influence both diseases, it is important to elucidate the role of diet in the progression of atherosclerosis. In addition, the mechanisms involved in dietary-related alterations of the disease need to be defined to guide public health recommendations to reduce athero-sclerosis incidence and limiting unwanted side effects. Since diet is thought to play a role in atherosclerosis even without added complications due to type II diabetes, reducing the incidence of that metabolic disease will not be enough. While evidence is increasing that high intake of carbohydrate can lead to type II diabetes and atherosclerosis, the preponderance of existing evidence indicates that intake of specific fats as a major dietary causal factor. It has recently been hypothesized that a dietary fat link to atherosclerosis may depend partly on the activity of a transcriptional regulator, the peroxisome proliferator activated receptors (PPAR). Thusfar, PPAR $\alpha$, $\beta$/$\delta$ and ${\gamma}$, have been shown to play a major role in metabolism, inflammation, and cancer. Furthermore, PPAR may regulate specific processes associated with atherosclerosis such as triglyceride and low density lipoprotein (LDL) metabolism; the reverse cholesterol transport pathway; lipid accumulation within plaques; the local inflammatory response and plaque stability. Synthetic ligands for PPAR have been developed; however, natural ligands include specific fatty acids and their metabolites. Though the role of PPAR in atherosclerosis has been reported with respect to synthetic ligands, additional studies need to be done with established and possible natural ligands. In this review, we will focus on the relation of dietary fat to PPAR alteration of atherosclerosis.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.54 no.4
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• pp.477-484
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• 2016

There is renewed interest in natural products as a starting point for discovery of drugs for schistosomiasis. Recent studies have shown that phytol reveals interesting in vivo and in vitro antischistosomal properties against Schistosoma mansoni adult worms. Here, we report the in vitro antischistosomal activity of phytol against Schistosoma haematobium juvenile and adult worms and alterations on the tegumental surface of the worms by means of scanning electron microscopy. The assay, which was carried out with 6 concentrations (25, 50, 75, 100, 125, and $150{\mu}g/ml$) of phytol, has shown a promising activity in a dose and time-dependent manner. There was a significant decline in the motility of the worms and a mortality rate of 100% was found at 48 hr after they had been exposed to phytol in the concentration of $150{\mu}g/ml$. Male worms were more susceptible. On the ultrastructural level, phytol also induced tegumental peeling, disintegration of tubercles and spines in addition to morphological disfiguring of the oral and ventral suckers. This report provides the first evidence that phytol is able to kill S. haematobium of different ages, and emphasizes that it is a promising natural product that could be used for development of a new schistosomicidal agent.

• Toxicological Research
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.373-382
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• 2007

This study was conducted to obtain acute information of the oral dose toxicity of PGB-1, a novel polyglucosamine polymer produced from a new strain Enterobacter sp. BL-2 in male and female mice. In order to calculated 50% lethal dose ($LD_{50}$) and approximate lethal dose (LD), test material was once orally administered to male and female ICR mice at dose levels of 2000, 1000, 500, 250, 125 and 0 (vehicle control) ml/kg (body wt.). The mortality and changes on body weight, clinical signs, gross observation and organ weight and histopathology of principle organs were monitored 14 days after dosing with PGB-1. We could not find any mortalities, clinical signs, body weight changes and gross findings. In addition, significant changes in the organ weight and histopathology of principal organs were not observed except for some sporadic findings. The results obtained in this study suggest that PGB-1 may not be toxic in mice and may be therefore safe for clinical use. The $LD_{50}$ and approximate LD in mice after single oral dose of PGB-1 were considered over 2000 mg/kg in both female and male mice.

• CELLMED
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.27.1-27.6
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• 2020

Cancer is one of the leading cause of mortality in India as well as worldwide. The management of cancer by conventional therapy has shown life threatening adverse effects. The researchers are now exploring the natural way of treatment. Unani system of medicine have rich literature for cancer and many compound formulations have been described in this system. Unani system of medicine is based on holistic approach and treat human being as a unit with natural herbs, mineral and animal origin drugs. An important compound Unani formulation (CUF) from the literature has been chosen to explore the Unani claim of its anticancer activity. The phytochemical constituents were assessed using standard phytochemical screening method. Antioxidant property of this formulation was assessed by DPPH assay. The DPPH free radical scavenging assay was carried out by colorimetric method and ascorbic acid was taken as a positive control. Three different extracts of CUF on different concentrations were used to screening on human breast cancer (BCC) MCF-7 cell line. For the estimation of in-vitro cytotoxic potency of the investigated extracts was assessed on MTT assay by using trypan blue method and paclitaxel was used as the standard. Hydro-ethanolic (HE) extract showed highest free radical scavenging activity among all extracts. DPPH Assay showed substantial antioxidant activity of these extracts in hydro-ethanol extract at 1㎍ concentration of CUF. The CUF showed antioxidant and anticancer activity. The claim made by Unani physician has been proved.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Fisheries and Ocean Technology
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• v.55 no.4
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• pp.310-319
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• 2019

Although mud shrimp (Upogebia Major) provides benefits on the tidal flat ecosystem, it is causing the mass mortality of Manila clam (Tapes philippinarum) and large economic loss to the aquaculture farmer due to spreading in the entire coastal clam farm area of the West Sea of Korea. In this study, a mud shrimp blocking box for cultivating clam was tested to prevent the mud shrimp from invading the habitat of the clam. To determine the effect of the blocking box, the growth characteristics of the clams under various culture conditions were investigated. The shell length, total weight, condition index, the presence of mud shrimp in the box, and the soil decay in the box were examined according to whether the clams were raised in the box or in natural state, whether the box is covered with a net or not and the gap size of the box. As a result, no significant differences in shell length, total weight, and condition index were found between the clam grown in the box and the natural state (P>0.05) without any evidence of invading of mud shrimp to the box. In addition, the soil inside the box was in good condition, not decayed. Therefore, using the mud shrimp blocking box, mud shrimp can be prevented from propagating to the habitat of the clam, thereby contributing to the normal production of the clam and thus to restoring the clam farming.

• Journal of Korean Society of Industrial and Systems Engineering
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.147-153
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• 2017

The mortality rate in industrial accidents in South Korea was 11 per 100,000 workers in 2015. It's five times higher than the OECD average. Economic losses due to industrial accidents continue to grow, reaching 19 trillion won much more than natural disaster losses equivalent to 1.1 trillion won. It requires fundamental changes according to industrial safety management. In this study, We classified the risk of accidents in industrial complex of Ulju-gun using spatial analytics and data mining. We collected 119 data on accident data, factory characteristics data, company information such as sales amount, capital stock, building information, weather information, official land price, etc. Through the pre-processing and data convergence process, the analysis dataset was constructed. Then we conducted geographically weighted regression with spatial factors affecting fire incidents and calculated the risk of fire accidents with analytical model for combining Boosting and CART (Classification and Regression Tree). We drew the main factors that affect the fire accident. The drawn main factors are deterioration of buildings, capital stock, employee number, officially assessed land price and height of building. Finally the predicted accident rates were divided into four class (risk category-alert, hazard, caution, and attention) with Jenks Natural Breaks Classification. It is divided by seeking to minimize each class's average deviation from the class mean, while maximizing each class's deviation from the means of the other groups. As the analysis results were also visualized on maps, the danger zone can be intuitively checked. It is judged to be available in different policy decisions for different types, such as those used by different types of risk ratings.

• Biomedical Science Letters
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.280-284
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• 2018

The incidence of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) is increasing rapidly in developed countries, with CVDs now representing the leading cause of morbidity and mortality. Natural products and ethnomedicines have been shown to reduce the risk of CVDs. Garlic is a medicinal plant used throughout the world for its anti-inflammatory, antioxidant, and antiplatelet activities. Chitosan is a natural polysaccharide obtained from chitin, and derivatives of chitosan have been shown to inhibit platelet aggregation and adhesion. We hypothesized that fermented preparations of these products may possess stronger antiplatelet effects than the non-fermented forms owing to the increased bioavailability of the bioactive compounds produced during fermentation. Therefore, we compared these compounds via in vitro and ex vivo platelet aggregation assays by using standard light transmission aggregometry and ex vivo granule secretions from rat platelets. We found that fermented preparations exerted more potent and significant inhibition of platelet aggregation both in vitro and ex vivo. Likewise, ATP release from dense granules of platelets was also significantly inhibited in fermented preparation-treated rat platelets compared to that in non-fermented preparation-treated ones. We concluded that fermented preparations exerted more potent effects on platelet function both in vitro and ex vivo, possibly as a result of the increased bioavailability of active compounds produced during fermentation. We therefore suggest that fermented products may be potent therapeutics against platelet-related CVDs and can be used as antiplatelet and antithrombotic agents.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.96 no.2
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• pp.160-169
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• 2007

The data used to develop distance-independent individual models for natural mixed forests were collected from 712 remeasured permanent sample plots (25,526 trees) of 10-year periodic from 1990 to 2000 in Baihe Forest Bureau of Changbai Mountains, northeast China. Based on analyzing relationship between diameter increment of individual trees with tree size, competitive status, and site condition, the diameter growth models for individual trees of 15 species growing in mixed-species uneven-aged forest stands, that have simple form, good predicting precision, and easily applicable, were developed using stepwise regression method. The main variables influencing on diameter increment of individual trees were tree size and competition, however, the site conditions were not significantly related with diameter increment. The tree size variables (lnDBH and $DBH^2$) were the most significant and important predictors of diameter growth existing in all 15 growth models. The diameter increment was directly proportional to tree diameter for each species. For the competitive factors in growth model, the relative diameter (RD), canopy closure (P), and the ratio of diameter of subject tree with maximum diameter (DDM) were contributed to the diameter increment at a certain extent. Other measures of stand density, such as basal area of stand (G) and stand density index (SDI), were not significantly influenced on diameter increment. Site factors, such as site index, slope and aspect were not important to diameter increment and excluded in the final models. The total variance explained by the final models of squared diameter increment ($R^2$) for all 15 species ranged from 35% to 72% and these results compared quit closely with those of Wykoff (1990) for mixed conifer stands. Using independent data set, validation measures were evaluated for predicting models of diameter increment developed in this study. The result indicated that the estimated precision was all greater than 94% and the models were suitable to describe diameter increment.